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| James Thomas |
 Posted: Mon May 23, 2011 5:09 pm Post subject: Tales of the Old Margreve Adventures! |
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Joined: 19 Feb 2010
Posts: 727
Location: Rocklin, California
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Richard Pett – I want to send you a “Huzzah!” for your Margreve adventure: Hallow. I GM’d it today with my family. My wife played a deer-centaur druid, my son, age 11, was a ranger and sometimes cleric and my daughter Lillian, age 6, played a faerie dragon. Being level 2 characters they had a decent chance facing the challenges you designed. The bee swarm turned out to be the most frustrating challenge since they did not have effective attacks against a swarm (minus the faerie dragon). They faced the hollow man on the 2nd night of his visitations after organizing the villagers to send out alarms when he appeared again. They were successful defeating him by using produce flame spells and grease from the faerie dragon to increase the fire damage. A lucky grease on a recently-severed head made it a frustrating time for the hollow man to pick up his trophy! Eventually he was worn down by fire and tumbled into a pile of useless timber. We had a lot of fun! The end is still to come with a confrontation with the singing tree. The animals are still hearing the singing from the forest and they will need to backtrack to the tree to make an end of it. We’ll tackle it later this week. After playing the adventure I see how well you designed the hollow man to match the story progression. This is notable and I’ll use it in my own designs.  Thanks again! |
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| Rich Pett |
| Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 3:44 am Post subject: |
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Joined: 07 Jan 2008
Posts: 115
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Good stuff James, and thanks, I'm glad your family had fun with it.
In the last playtest at Paziocon the group didn't get to the singing tree so let me know how it went will you?
Huzzah!
Rich |
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| James Thomas |
| Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 7:34 am Post subject: |
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Joined: 19 Feb 2010
Posts: 727
Location: Rocklin, California
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| Okay! The Hollow Man is dead and the party tracked their way to the Singing Tree. The confusion singing and the summon centipede weeping kept them from landing deadly force on the tree. The cleric was rendered to -3 and stabalized and the druid deer-centaur was staggered by the crushing attacks of the tree's limbs. The faerie dragon distracted the tree and drew it away from the other two. The deer centaur staggered over to the cleric and dragged him away from the scene. A day later they went at it again! This time bringing fire to bear and landing a couple of good blows brought it down! Huzzah! |
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| Rich Pett |
| Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 10:58 am Post subject: |
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| mightymongo |
| Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 9:32 pm Post subject: Grandmother's Fire at Paizocon 2011 - Spoilers! |
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Joined: 20 Jun 2010
Posts: 1028
Location: Portland, OR
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I was looking forward to this one, I loved the Grimm's fairy tale quality to it from the first time I read the pitch.
Synopsis - Spoilers! ****************
The party was driving their caravan down the tinker's trail...they were impressed by all the wagons, named ponies (Bill!) and trade goods they started with....The lich hounds burst out of the woods after the peasants and started savaging the ponies (poor Bill!). The party didn't seem too concerned until they heard the hoofbeats and the ghoul knights burst out of the trees with lances bearing down on them!("They're riding ghost horses!!!!"). Undaunted, the witch cast a lightning spell that took out the living mounts, dismounting two of the knights. After the inital charge, the other knights dismounted and started laying about with their battle axes as well. Moothal the barbarian laughed off critical hits and Fortitude saves left and right, but Ozla the rogue seemed to take every hit badly and was soon paralyzed. Fortunately Alaran the bard took advantage of the wagons' cover and dragged Ozla to safety with some nifty Acrobatics checks. (Check the KQ website for some of Alaran's better quotes....).
Eventually the knights were defeated, the peasants interrogated, and they were off to the Walking Hut. After some confused walking in circles, the bard remembered a childhood rhyme which allowed the party entrance. They started their discussion with Little Grandmother by presenting her with the Feather Token/Swanboat magic item as a gift, so she decided not to eat them. She explained Dmitri's theft, and her punishment. When she grew tired of being interrogated, she slapped the mortar & pestle with her iron nails, and terrified & pitiful screams came from within, so the party took this as a sign to leave. Fortunately, on the way out, Ozla remembered to ask how they might find Dmitri...she waved a gnarled talon negligently, and the footsteps appeared. She then went back to torturing whoever was in the bowl.
On the way out, the witch, Kanath Heathernight, spoke with the golden-eyed cat. The cat said, if you bring me a treat or toy, I will will give you a gift....
The party followed the footprints to the clearing. With their strong perception skills, they saw the woodsmen stacking logs...forgetting this was the Margreve, they decided to walk up whistling and singing, so as not to frighten the poor fellows. When they reached the edge of the clearing, they realized their mistake, and terse negotiations with the werewolves began. Despite massive Diplomacy successes by Alaran, the rest of the party kept insisting that the wolves hand over Dmitri, so battle ensued. Again, Moothal the barbarian laughed off axeblows and bites, while Ozla the rogue seemed to end up in front and in the negatives again....?
After defeating the werewolves, the party freed Dmitri and the dwarves. The dwarves were effuse in their thanks, looted the axes, bows and cloaks from the wolves, and took their leave. Getting the full story from Dmitri, they proceeded towards the vodyanoi's pool, encountering Elena the rusalka on the way. Using the gift of the magic waters she provided, the party proceeded to the pool and confronted the vodyanoi. They were fairly confident they could defeat this strange little frog-man, until the steaming water elementals rose out of the pool. Using their water walking abilities, the barbarian and rogue charged the vodyanoi while the spellcasters tried to keep the elementals busy. They were so devastating in combat (the barbarian had TWO critical hits), the final fight was the shortest, as the elementals flowed away when the vodyanoi was destroyed...but Ozla the rogue ended up in negatives again....! (She seemed to constantly confuse "frontal attack" with "sneak attack").....anyway, the skull rescued, Dmitri and Elena went to their final rest together, the party took the skull back to a grateful Grandmother, along with the bluerose tea, so she promised to reward them with a truthful answer when they needed it, but reminded them that the truth is not always easy to hear.
On the way back to the Walking Hut, the witch Kanath also remembered to cast a sleep spell on some small birds and bring them back to the golden-eyed cat as treats and toys, so the cat agreed to give one truthful answer too, but as everyone knows, cats are born liars, so that is a story for another day..... |
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| mightymongo |
| Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2011 12:33 am Post subject: Redcloak Ruckus - Tales of Zobeck - Paizocon 2011 |
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Joined: 20 Jun 2010
Posts: 1028
Location: Portland, OR
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Redcloak Ruckus (from Tales of Zobeck?) - Paizocon 2011
************ Spoiler Alert !!! *****************
The "falling inn" opening scene in Ruckus went even better than I hoped.
I did one map on the battlemat, told them to place their minatures on the map, then dropped a gamepaper map with the fallen wall and water tower on top of it with their characters in the same spots. We shocked them! The increasing falling debris damage plus the fleeing NPCs clued everyone that a quick exit was in order, and they managed to capture two of the Wreckers, so I just made one of them Nicktail. (they left the other unconscious one behind for the mob as a delaying tactic!).
The ghetto riot mechanic was still cludgy: a long "railroad" map with 1 - 2 combats and 2 - 4 triggered events on it still might work better. They kept trying to yank open doors & windows to "get off the streets!" - so each time they succeeded in a Str or disable device check to open a locked door or shutter, I just sprung one of the prepared traps. They got the message pretty quick. "Who keeps a half-ton of broken lumber, nails & spikes above a door anyways? Much less rotten fruit and formaldehyde! Geez!".
The gnome (!) fought a rearguard action twice (!) with lightning bolts. You've never seen six people so anxious to find a red door! The text seemed to contradict itself on whether the red door was bolted or broken down by rioters, so I said it was busted off the hinges, but still propped against the frame. The basilisk gave the party much more trouble than Gnomesnatcher and his minions. Sari the dwarven rogue killed the antipaladin with a massive crit/flanking attack. You should have seen the look on their faces tho', when I said "kobold antipaladin" and he came out from hiding with fiendish purple fire coming from his hands!
They captured another Wrecker and we were short on time, so I just had the new prisoner ("Snaggletusk") lead them to the secret door to Nerborg's crypt/lair. We didn't need the "fixer" element to keep them moving to the final encounter, and we may want to leave it out entirely going forward in tournament play. They beat the clockwork and the ape, but Nerborg flew away invisibly. They hated the clockwork's firejet weapon, and hated it even worse when the clockwork blew up!
But I guess any boss fight you can walk away from...
Edit: edited the next morning for clarity after I got some sleep.... 
Last edited by mightymongo on Thu Jun 16, 2011 8:28 am; edited 1 time in total |
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| James Thomas |
| Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2011 7:42 am Post subject: |
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Joined: 19 Feb 2010
Posts: 727
Location: Rocklin, California
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MightyMongo! Great hearing about your Margreve adventure. Grandmother's Fire is a MUST play adventure. I can't wait to run it myself! Nicely written, I feel like I was there.
Redcloak Ruckus sounds like fun too. A clockwork with a firejet weapon? Sounds familiar.... Ben! Is this what I think it is? 'Cause I feel like I was there even more.  |
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